Foundation, Inc., 51 Franklin Street, Fifth Floor, Boston, MA 02110-1301, USA.</code></pre><p><strong>Addendum:</strong> When distributing binaries of the LameXP software, it is <em>strictly forbidden</em> to bundle the LameXP program files and/or the LameXP installation program with any kind of <em>Adware</em>, <em>Spyware</em> or <em>PUP (potentially unwanted program)</em>, including, but not limited to, any downloaders, dialers, browser toolbars/extensions or restricted shareware/demo programs. It is, however, perfectly legitimate to bundle LameXP with other <em>OpenSource</em> programs, according to the OSI (Open Source Initiative). Finally, it is also legitimate to bundle LameXP with <em>commercial software</em>, as long as that software does <em>not</em> meet the criteria of <em>Adware</em>, <em>Spyware</em> or <em>PUP</em>. If you bundle the LameXP software with another software, you are <em>required</em> to make sure that the user is provided with an easy way to install and start the LameXP software separately from that other software.</p><h1data-number="3"id="anti-virus-notes"><spanclass="header-section-number">3</span> Anti-Virus Notes</h1><p>Occasionally, it may happen that your anti-virus software <em>mistakenly</em> detects <ahref="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malware">malware</a> (virus, trojan horse, worm, etc.) while you are trying to run the LameXP application or the LameXP setup program. This is called a <ahref="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antivirus_software#Problems_caused_by_false_positives"><strong>false positive</strong></a> and the file actually is <strong>not</strong> malware. Instead, this is an error (bug) in your particular anti-virus software! In case that you encounter this kind problem, we highly recommend using <ahref="http://www.virustotal.com/">VirusTotal.com</a>, <ahref="http://www.virscan.org/">Virscan.org</a> or a similar web-service to check the file in question with <em>multiple</em> anti-virus engines. Unless the vast majority of the anti-virus engines detect malware, it can be assumed that the file is really harmless. However, please take care with <em>heuristic</em> scan results, such as "suspicious", "generic" or "packed". Those results are <strong>not</strong> malware detections – they are highly speculative and (almost certainly) can be ignored safely!</p><p>Defective anti-virus software is an ongoing annoyance! For example, anti-virus programs tend to suspect installers (or uninstallers) created with <ahref="http://nsis.sourceforge.net/">NSIS</a>– which includes the LameXP setup program. But, of course, installers created with NSIS are perfectly legitimate. Thus, if your anti-virus program complains about the LameXP setup program, please ignore the <em>nonsensical</em> warning! Furthermore, it seems that some anti-virus programs accuse <em>all</em> "packed" executables of being malware. Nonetheless, using so-called "executable packers", e.g. <ahref="http://upx.sourceforge.net/">UPX</a>, is perfectly legitimate. Executable packers are commonly used by legitimate software, including numerous OpenSource projects – and so does LameXP. Thus, if your anti-virus program complains about the LameXP program file, because it has been "packed" by UPX, please ignore the <em>nonsensical</em> warning!</p><p>Last but not least: Always keep in mind that LameXP is <em>free software</em>, which means that the <em>source codes</em> of LameXP are freely available. Everybody can easily see that there is <strong><em>no</em></strong> malware of any kind included in the LameXP source code! If you do <em>not</em> trust the provided <em>binaries</em> of LameXP, you may build your own binary directly from the LameXP source codes…</p><h2data-number="3.1"id="reporting-false-positives"><spanclass="header-section-number">3.1</span> Reporting False Positives</h2><p>An important fact to consider is, that, for the developer of a legitimate application, it is <em>impossible</em> to know <strong>why</strong> a specific anti-virus software may be <em>misinterpreting</em> his or her a
-----END PGP PUBLIC KEY BLOCK-----</code></pre><h2data-number="9.6"id="q-why-does-lamexp-connect-to-random-web-servers"><spanclass="header-section-number">9.6</span> Q: Why does LameXP connect to (random) web-servers?</h2><p><strong>A:</strong> LameXP does <strong>not</strong> connect to any web-server, except for the "automatic updates" feature. Of course, in order to check for new updates, LameXP <em>unavoidably</em> has to communicate with our update servers. However, in <strong>no</strong> event LameXP will search for updates <em>without</em> your consent. Also, LameXP will <strong>not</strong> send any personal information to the update server. Instead of <em>uploading</em> your information, e.g. your current program version, to the web-server, LameXP will <em>download</em> the update information from the update server and compare it to your installed version locally. Furthermore, all information and program files downloaded from the update servers are protected by PGP (GnuPG) signatures, in order to assure the authenticity and integrity of these files. Files with missing/invalid signature are going to be <em>rejected</em>, so (spoofing) attacks are prevented.</p><p><em>Note:</em> Before LameXP actually tries to download information from our update servers, it will check your Internet connection. Only checking whether the update server itself is reachable does <strong>not</strong> suffice here. In case that the update server does <strong>not</strong> respond, this could mean that our servers are currently experiencing problems, but it could also mean that your Internet connection is failing. In order to distinguish these cases, LameXP will validate the Internet connection prior to connecting to the update server. For this purpose, LameXP contains a rather long list of "known" hosts, taken mostly from <ahref="http://www.alexa.com/topsites">Alexa's Top 500</a> list. In order to validate the Internet connection, LameXP will pick a <em>random</em> host from the list and check whether that host can be reached. This process will be repeated, until a certain minimum number of "known" hosts have been reached.</p><h2data-number="9.7"id="q-can-lamexp-convert-tracks-from-an-audio-cd"><spanclass="header-section-number">9.7</span> Q: Can LameXP convert tracks from an Audio CD?</h2><p><strong>A:</strong> LameXP <em>can</em> be used to convert audio files that have been extracted from an Audio CD, but it currently can <strong>not</strong> extract ("rip") the audio tracks from the Audio CD directly. Consequently you will have to extract the audio tracks first, before you can convert them with LameXP. We recommend using the <ahref="http://www.exactaudiocopy.de/"><em>Exact Audio Copy</em></a> software for that purpose. When ripping tracks from an Audio CD, always save the tracks as <em>uncompressed</em> Wave files (or as lossless FLAC files) in order to avoid quality loss!</p><p><em>Warning:</em> The Windows Explorer will show CDA files (such as <code>Track01.cda</code>) on an Audio CD. These are just <em>dummy</em> files! Actually an Audio CD does <strong>not</strong> contain a file system. Thus there are <strong>no</strong> files either. There only are <em>audio tracks</em> on an Audio CD. These audio tracks <em>can</em> be extracted as files (e.g. Wave Audio files), by using a proper ripping software. Then the extracted files can be converted. At the same time, any attempt to convert the dummy <code>*.cda</code> files is <strong>not</strong> going to work!</p><h2data-number="9.8"id="q-why-does-lamexp-run-only-n-instances-in-parallel"><spanclass="header-section-number">9.8</span> Q: Why does LameXP run (only) N instances in parallel?</h2><p><strong>A:</strong> LameXP can massively speed-up the encoding process by taking advantage of <em>multi-core</em> computers. This is achieved by running <em>multiple</em> encoder (or decoder) instances in parallel. Since most audio encoders are single-threaded and therefore can <strong>not</strong> utilize more than a single CPU core, LameXP will launch one encoder instance p
